it is a story of light vs dark but neither side is necessarily good or evil. multiple times in the story we will hear someone call the cabal and hive as "evil’’ or ‘‘monsters’’. these species are societies made up of trillions of individuals who are completely sentient just like humans but most of the time the vanguard will tell guardians to show no mercy and to kill with no hesitation. shiro 4 refers to them as cattle to slaughter in kill patrols.

one example of this extreme black and white view is in the savathuns song strike. after the ghost realizes that the hive were converting guardians to crystals to summon the shrieker he reacts by saying this ‘‘so many lives wasted the hive truly are monsters’’ there were about 9 guardians who directly invaded hive territory fully armed who possibly killed hundreds of hive. but the ghost doesn’t value their lives and thinks that human lives are the only ones that matter and everyone else is below them by saying this he is no different from the hive.

the city intends to completely exterminate all their enemies and are committed to genocide the biggest proof of this is their targeting of prime servitors. if you don’t know prime servitors are a houses main source of ether destroying them will cut the flow of ether and starves the population of said house to death not just soldiers but entire families including women and children this ensures that no more fallen remain to fight by committing genocide. this is why they protect servitors with fanatical devotion and we rarely ever see prime servitors actively attack the city. and you get praised and are called a ‘‘hero’’ for causing mass suffering.

dredgen yor is another example other than destroying palamon he rarely ever killed an innocent. in most of his stories he is either killing fully armed guardians or bandits neither are innocent. his ghost calls him a murderer but yor says he was always a murderer which is true in the end he was trying to prove a point although betraying your own people is evil.

the last point i have is skolas. skolas was a true hero as his intentions were always good he wanted to unite his people to stop fighting each other and instead fighting their true enemies although his means were questionable he did what he had to in the situation infact the last thing he did before dying was nothing less then noble he warned his greatest enemy the queen of the much bigger threat which he found with his time with the vex namely oryx, he gave them a chance to survive.

many people call the hive evil the hive don’t kill for the sake of killing, they kill to survive i like to compare them to lions. nobody blames a lion for killing a deer its just trying to survive its the same for the hive. we see in the books of sorrow that the hive clearly don’t enjoy genocide multiple times oryx laments the amount of suffering he caused but came to accept the fact that he does not have much of a choice he gives his enemies a fair chance to fight back. we never see the city take prisoners they don’t even have a prison they don’t leave survivors but can you blame them they are a victim like everyone else victims to war. the true enemies are not the hive or cabal the true enemies are the worms and the traveler higher powers who use everyone else as slave armies to fight for their cause.

the real reason ghaul was not chosen is not because he did bad things it’s because he did not completely wipe out humanity. the traveler wanted to see if ghaul was stronger and more capable to defend it than it’s previous guardians all ghaul had to do was continue to hunt down and eradicate the guardians but he thought they were broken and could not rise back up, hence why after the attack the only time we fight the red legion was when we directly attacked them in firebase hades. this is why the traveler woke up and killed ghaul after you defeated him you proved you were stronger in the end all ghaul had to do was what he was best at doing war. the true enemy is the light and the darkness. i rest my case.

there were about 9 guardians who directly invaded hive territory fully armed who possibly killed hundreds of hive. but the ghost doesn’t value their lives and thinks that human lives are the only ones that matter and everyone else is below them by saying this he is no different from the hive.

The fireteam that first investigated Savathun’s song were investigating a summoning ritual involving Savathun’s Song, which was going to be used by someone- presumably Savathun herself- to “lay eyes on [Titan].” Savathun, like her brother, follows the Sword Logic, and they, along with all of the Hive, want to “eat the Traveler” and kill all those who follow the Light, as they did with the Ammonite. Even within the strike, there’s violence and torture enacted at the hands of the Hive:

Taeko-3: We came down here as a squad of nine. Got picked off one by one. Watched a wizard rip the Light out of my best friend and funnel it into some kind of crystal.

Male voice: No! No, please, you already took my Ghost, please!

And this has happened before, most notably to Omar Agah. Saying that Ghost is equal to the Hive because he called them monsters doesn’t take into account the genocide perpetrated by the Worm Gods and their servants.

housestone:

if you don’t know prime servitors are a houses main source of ether destroying them will cut the flow of ether and starves the population of said house to death not just soldiers but entire families including women and children this ensures that no more fallen remain to fight by committing genocide. this is why they protect servitors with fanatical devotion and we rarely ever see prime servitors actively attack the city.

A note, the Fallen protect their Servitors because they are “quasi-religious automata,” not just because they have fallen at the hands of Guardians. Also, if we’re discussing the deaths of innocents:

A disciple of the Prime Servitor Kaliks, Aksor initiated brutal crusades against human settlements beyond the City and ravaged countless Awoken enclaves throughout the Reef.

“The Fang used to do hit-and-run attacks against civilian targets during the worst days of the Reef Wars. I’m not sure, but I think that’s what made Variks turn against Skolas. Assassins unleashed on miners, on teachers. That’s a long way to fall.” - Petra

Are the Fallen much more morally grey than a race like the Hive? Yes. Are they currently stopping their attack on the City and offering peace? No. There’s a constant state of war with the Fallen, from the Devils to the Wolves to the Splicers. In wartime, killing major assets to the Fallen, like Prime Servitors, is not out of malice but instead out of hope to help “a City desperate for relief.”

housestone:

the last point i have is skolas. skolas was a true hero as his intentions were always good he wanted to unite his people to stop fighting each other and instead fighting their true enemies although his means were questionable he did what he had to in the situation

Like I mentioned earlier, Skolas targeted and killed civilian targets. Why do his ends justify his means? Twilight Gap almost destroyed the City completely, and had the Wolves been able to help the Fallen then it’s possible humanity would have been wiped out completely. Why is their killing of humanity more noble and worthy than humanity’s fight back against the Fallen?

housestone:

many people call the hive evil the hive don’t kill for the sake of killing they kill to survive i like to compare them to lions nobody blames a lion for killing a deer its just trying to survive its the same for the hive we see in the books of sorrow that the hive clearly don’t enjoy genocide multiple times oryx laments the amount of suffering he caused but came to accept the fact that he does not have much of a choice he gives his enemies a fair chance to fight back.

I don’t think lions killing deer is the same as the Hive completely eradicating dozens of species. Oryx feels “sorrow,” yes, but he’s also joyous at how much the Hive have killed:

Sorrow, because we have killed so much (eighteen species this century alone), and joy for the same reason. Joy that we have put down these blights. Scoured them away and left the universe clean, ready to move towards its final shape. We are a wind of progress. Ripping parasites from the material world — for if they were not parasites, we would be unable to kill them, and they would still exist.

Even if he was regretful, this is still genocide on a massive scale. What of all the “women and children” on any of these planets, being eradicated much more severely than the killing of the Fallen Primes? Is giving a species a “fair chance” to fight back before slaughtering them justifiable? What about those who were not quasi-immortal like the Osmium Siblings; was that truly a fight that a race could win?

housestone:

the true enemies are not the hive or cabal the true enemies are the worms and the traveler higher powers who use everyone else as slave armies to fight for their cause.

Why is the Light equivalent to the Darkness, here? The Light has not been responsible for the genocide of any race that we know of, the Darkness and the Sword Logic are. The Light is running from the Darkness, and the Darkness is determined to destroy it and any touched by it. Why is the Light being held responsible for the actions of the Darkness? Should the Light just give up and be eaten, plunging the universe into Darkness and death by the Sword Logic, so that it’s not ‘just as bad as the Darkness’?

housestone:

the real reason ghaul was not chosen is not because he did bad things it’s because he did not completely wipe out humanity the traveler wanted to see if ghaul was stronger and more capable to defend it than it’s previous guardians all ghaul had to do was continue to hunt down and eradicate the guardians but he thought they were broken and could not rise back up hence why after the attack the only time we fight the red legion was when we directly attacked them in firebase hades.

Apologies, but what do you mean? The moral of Destiny 2 is that the Light cannot be taken through war and slaughter, it must be given freely- that is what makes it the opposite of the Darkness itself. We are fighting Red Legion troops throughout the entirety of the game, as they are still intent on acquiring the Light and then exterminating humanity through the use of the Almighty. Despite ‘winning’ the war and destroying the City, proving his ‘worth,’ the Traveler still does not grant him the Light, and instead rebukes him at the end of the campaign. Being the “best at war” isn’t what the Traveler wants- it grants peace wherever it goes, allowing Golden Ages of civilizations, and the Darkness destroys and consumes them. In my opinion, saying the Light is just as bad as the Darkness lacks the nuance shown throughout the game with regards to races like the Fallen and what they have become.

the city did not offer any peace either. although thanks for sharing your pov its always better to have different views on a subject.

you say that skolas had killed civilians which he never did the silent fang did that, skolas docked one of his commanders for causing to many wolf casualties even though he won skolas was not evil you say that his ends don’t justify his means the same could be applied to the city destroying prime servitors, yes they want to stop fallen raids but killing children is never the solution ever.

i also never call the hive as good they are evil atleast most leaders are. we have 1 example of the traveler committing genocide though it is not completely proven. the syzygy was most likely caused by the traveler to stop the worms from getting any allies which killed trillions.

you say that the light is not given through war and slaughter even though that is exactly what we do to get it back we attack the city and kill ghaul not evil nor good just war. if the light is given to those who do good then why does humanity deserve the light more then the cabal. why does the traveler abandon the species he blessed ones the darkness arrives. the thing is the traveler does not really care about who he blesses unless they can fight and defend it.

this is what osiris argues about. the light may seem to have good intentions but from what i observe the traveler gifts a species that is strong to earn their trust, then gives them the means to create powerful weapons and waits till the darkness arrives if they survive he stays if they don’t he flees to find someone better regardless if rasputin shot the traveler or not he stayed because humanity could fight. humans never do anything actually good to deserve the light they are always fighting among themselves and were always at the brink exterminating themselves just take a look at our history then you will know what i’m talking about. throughout the lore we see guardians questioning why they are fighting. they are a slave army to the light just like the hive are a slave army to the dark.

i am also not calling humanity monsters they are clearly fighting to survive it is apparent that they completely despise the fallen beyond reason, infact the fallen despise humanity beyond reason too i am not saying the fallen are better than humans. humanity would never share the traveler nor would the fallen, nobodies morally better than the other. they fight each other showing no mercy despite being very similar.

you say that skolas had killed civilians which he never did the silent fang did that

The Silent Fang fell under the command of Drevis and Skolas.

Instrumental in Skolas’ rise to kellship among the Wolves, the Silent Fang also menaced the Queen during the Reef War.

Variks: No sign of Skolas, but the Silent Fang. He has unleashed the Fang. They hunt the Devils. On Earth.

“Some of Skolas’s Silent Fang are riling the Hive on Earth. I’d say let the Hive have them, but we need to be sure.” —Petra

Did Skolas himself do it? No, but implying that he had no part in it isn’t correct. He was, if not actively participating- which, given Variks’ distaste and Skolas’ history, is not an impossibility- he was at the very least complicit.

housestone:

skolas docked one of his commanders for causing to many wolf casualties even though he won

Though technically a victory for Skolas, the Eos Clash came at a terrible cost for him. He docked Peekis’ arms and demoted him to Dreg as punishment for his recklessness.

Skolas didn’t dock him out of a sense of justice for the casualties he caused, Peekis was docked because his attack was too reckless and it cost Skolas troops and two fleets.

housestone:

you say that his ends don’t justify his means the same could be applied to the city destroying prime servitors, yes they want to stop fallen raids but killing children is never the solution ever.

I didn’t say “his ends don’t justify his means,” I asked “Why do his ends justify his means?” You say that Skolas “did what he had to in the situation,” which includes the killing of innocents, but you also say that the City is “committed to genocide” for killing Prime Servitors. You can say that both are pushed to desperation, but calling Skolas a “true hero” whose intentions were “always good” is demonizing one side at the expense of the other. I’m not going to defend killing innocents, but Skolas was not a noble figure.

housestone:

we have 1 example of the traveler committing genocide though it is not completely proven.

As you say, this isn’t proven. What if the Worms orchestrated the syzygy to convince someone to free them from the deeps of Fundament? As the Leviathan says in XVIII:

—Sisters of Aurash, open your eyes++
++Who made you monsters? Who summoned the wave?—
—Make peace. Join with me in golden renewal.++

Even if the Traveler’s arrival was the cause of the syzygy, what if the people of the Fundament accepted the Light? We don’t know that they could have just left Fundament for one of its moons and resettled, if they needed to.

housestone:

you say that the light is not given through war and slaughter even though that is exactly what we do to get it back we attack the city and kill ghaul not evil nor good just war.

We don’t attack the City for the sole purpose of getting the Traveler back. The Guardians need it for their Light, yes, but this ignores a) the Almighty and b) the countless citizens killed or otherwise effected by the Red War. Additionally, the Cabal are fighting a campaign of extermination. Ghaul is the aggressor, and humanity is acting in self-defense; we don’t set out to commit genocide against them as they have seemingly done.

housestone:

if the light is given to those who do good then why does humanity deserve the light more then the cabal. why does the traveler abandon the species he blessed ones the darkness arrives. the thing is the traveler does not really care about who he blesses unless they can fight and defend it.

What’s your source regarding the idea that the Traveler “abandon[s] the species [she] blessed [once] the darkness arrives”? In fact, the Traveler only leaves the Ammonite after the Osmium Siblings have decimated them:

It’s done. Eir and Yul feed on the Leviathan’s carcass. Xivu Arath has made a temple of the Chroma-Admiral’s impaled corpse. Below us, Savathûn’s poisons stain the Ammonite home sea black. Their screams flavor the void.

if the light is given to those who do good then why does humanity deserve the light more then the cabal.

Why do you think that the Light is only given to those who are “good”? We don’t know exactly why the Traveler visited Sol. From its Destinypedia page:

The origins or nature of the Traveler is not clear to anyone. However, some information can be gleaned from the poem known as Dreams of Alpha Lupi. Based on this work, it appears that the Traveler chose Earth and humanity for a reason; it detected a “face” emerging from the Sun, later hearing a roar that contained something that it described as “a lucid melody”. The Traveler felt joy, as it felt “the first hope in ages transform [it],” and it resolved to become strong enough to fight the Darkness.[4]

There’s nothing about humanity being strong enough to repel the Darkness, here.

housestone:

throughout the lore we see guardians questioning why they are fighting. they are a slave army to the light just like the hive are a slave army to the dark.

Given the fact that Guardians aren’t constantly at the verge of being consumed by their Light, I still don’t think that the two are equivalent. Guardians have the liberty to question why they are fighting; if they really wanted to, one could go missing and never kill another being again, with no consequence. The Light isn’t bound to death like the Sword Logic is.

@erin has made some excellent points in her replies, so I will try not to repeat them in my own reply to your post and comments, although some of what I say may overlap with her comments.

Although it is true that Destiny is not a game where the morals are always clearly black and white, it is not the case that it promotes moral relativism, the philosophy that there are no objective moral truths. There are many cases in Destiny where there is clearly a difference between actions that are morally right or wrong, and where one side is being shown to be good while another side is being shown to be evil, or at the very least morally bad.

Take the case of Dredgen Yor as an example. He was responsible for the destruction of Palamon, the human settlement where Shin Malphur had lived, as mentioned in Ghost Fragment: The Last Word 4.The inhabitants of Palamon were not guardians, they would have been helpless against him, yet he killed them anyway and burned Palamon to the ground. This is a clear example of someone doing something that is morally wrong.

If I am being honest, I care only to give hope to the frightened, huddled masses so that when I come upon them they will have more to lose. Their pain will be greater. Their screams more pure.

This implies that, contrary to your claim, the inhabitants of Palamon are not the only innocent people he has killed. Nor does it sound like he would kill them swiftly and painlessly; instead, he would make sure that he prolonged their pain and their suffering. Wanting to cause such needless pain and suffering is an example of an act of evil.

You claim that the guardians Yor killed were not innocent, but what were they guilty of doing? Jaren Ward was protecting the surviving inhabitants of Palamon, including Shin Malphur, when Dredgen Yor killed him. What had he done that meant he deserved to be killed? What had Pahanin done? Or Thalor? Where is there any mention that they had committed the kinds of horrific acts that Dredgen Yor did?

As Erin mentioned, the Fallen are not as clearly evil a race as the Hive. Yet when they first arrived in our solar system, did they ever make an offering of peace towards humanity? Did they ever ask if they could share the Traveler with us, or if we would be willing to give it to them? There is no evidence that this has ever happened. The Fallen first arrived after the Collapse, before the City was built to give protection to what remained of humanity following the Collapse. There were no armies back then to fight against them, no large groups of guardians to stop them as they did during the Battles of Six Fronts and Twilight Gap. Many of the people the Fallen killed would have been unarmed and unable to protect themselves, yet they showed no mercy. Why should humanity show mercy to an enemy that has shown no mercy to them? Would it have been better for humanity to roll over and allow the Fallen to kill as many people as they like? There is nothing morally wrong with humanity wanting to protect their own and to defend themselves against an enemy that is intent on killing as many people as they can.

housestone:

many people call the hive evil the hive don’t kill for the sake of killing, they kill to survive i like to compare them to lions. nobody blames a lion for killing a deer its just trying to survive its the same for the hive. we see in the books of sorrow that the hive clearly don’t enjoy genocide multiple times oryx laments the amount of suffering he caused but came to accept the fact that he does not have much of a choice he gives his enemies a fair chance to fight back.

The hive may have initially accepted the bargain with the worms as a way of ensuring their survival, but their eradication of countless species is not about survival. They have killed many species not because they posed a threat to the Hive’s survival but because they believe that this is the way to help the universe achieve what they call the “final shape”, where the only species which exist are those which have proven that they are worthy of survival. If the Hive simply fought to ensure their own survival, then they would be content to be at peace once this goal has been achieved. But the Hive do not seek peace. As Oryx says in XLVIII: aiat, aiat, aiat, aiat, aiat, “Aiat: what is at war is healthy, what is at peace is sick.” Nor do they have any mercy for those who they consider to be weak, as mentioned in XLVII: Apocalypse Refrains:

Only by eradicating from ourselves all clemency for the weak can we emulate and become that which endures forever. This is inevitable. The universe offers only one choice and it is between ruthlessness and extinction.

The Hive do not always fight fairly against their enemies. They are willing to use trickery and cunning if that is what is necessary to win. Here is one example from during their war with the Ecumene:

Then Oryx and Xivu Arath made war on the Ecumene for forty years. At the end of those forty years Oryx said to the Dakaua Nest, listen, I am jealous of my sibling Xivu Arath, help me kill her. And in desperation they agreed.

But he drove the Dakaua Nest into a trap, and they were made extinct. From their ashes rose cunning Savathûn, saying, “I am trickery, and you have conjured me back with trickery.”

housestone:

i also never call the hive as good they are evil atleast most leaders are.

Wait, so now you’re admitting that the Hive actually are evil after all and that they’re not just fighting for their survival? In that case, isn’t humanity morally better than the Hive since we are fighting against them for our own survival, to prevent them from wiping out our species as they have done to so many others? How else is humanity supposed to deal with the Hive? Humanity cannot broker peace with a race that abhors peace, nor is showing the Hive mercy going to help when they refuse to show mercy to any race that they consider to be weak, including humanity. The Hive will want to wipe out humanity no matter how we treat them.

Fighting against evil such as the Hive does not mean that humanity is also evil, or morally bad. On the contrary, this is an example of good fighting against evil. To borrow from the famous quote (often attributed to Edmund Burke, although this has been disputed), “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” To claim that Destiny is not at all about good versus evil is simply not true, as the case of humanity fighting against the Hive shows.

I have very little to contribute to the already excellent responses, but I do have to say that, if the Fallen, Cabal, or even factions within those species genuinely offered peace, I think the City would very cautiously take it. Humanity in Destiny is under siege from all sides. Resources are limited. Some relief would be welcome.

However, none of the other species have offered peace, even when it would be to their advantage. The Wolves could have made overtures to the City while at war with the Reef, for instance, securing an ally or at least nonaggression. They didn’t even try.

I don’t necessarily have a problem with the conclusion of this post, but the arguments do not withstand careful scrutiny. It is possible to invite nuanced thinking in regards to the grey areas of morality without relying on problematic moral relativism. I’m not trying to be harsh to shut you down, I applaud you for attempting to analyze the morality within the game, but the arguments are inherently misguided as has been shown already.

Wasnt Skolas trying to unite the fallen houses to invade the city?
Im really confused with the last paragraph as well.

I do agree that destiny is not a story of good vs evil, but rather a story of pride, ignorance, arrogance, and power.
Winners make the history books, that is what we see with destiny.

The real problem is that evil just means what most of society views as wrong. So the society of each race probably has different views of what is “evil”. So I assume the Hive have a different view of what is evil. Its all opinion.

The Hive have systematically been not merely destroying peaceful, non-aggressive civilizations for eons, but have also been mind-raping them by Taking. Unless you abandon all pretense of ethics, they’re pretty freakin’ evil.

The Fallen and even the Vex present more interesting perspectives on morality. In the case of the former, they are in a dire situation and experienced lot of loss; for the latter, we’re only barely clear on the nature of their goals, origins, and methods. None of these complexities are an argument for actions having no moral value whatsoever.

Erin, Silverheart, and myself have all provided evidence to show that Destiny is a story of good vs evil. I won’t repeat what was said here but you may like to read what we have said in the other replies to this post.

Destiny is not a case of “winners make the history books”. There may be some cases where this is true, such as the Books of Sorrow which are mostly told from Oryx’s perspective. But there are plenty of other accounts, stories and legends within the lore that are not told from the perspective of the winners. For example, we have accounts of what happened during the Collapse, an event that nearly wiped out humanity. In the Exodus Blue card, it says:

Grimly referred to as “The Graveyard,” Exodus Blue was only recently secured for Crucible combat. Located among the ruins of one of the Cosmodrome’s colony ship gantries, this site is a memorial to the grief and horror of the Collapse. Thousands died here in a last-ditch effort to outrun the oncoming Darkness.

Even Rasputin was powerless against the Darkness, which caused the Collapse. In Ghost Fragment: Mysteries, which is generally thought to be told from the perspective of Rasputin, he describes what happened during the Collapse. Referring to IT, his name for the Darkness, he says:

Consider IT the power Titanomach world-ender and consider what IT means. I met IT at the gate of the garden and I recall IT smiled at me before before IT devoured the blossoms with black flame and pinned their names across the sky. IT was stronger than everything. I fought IT with aurora knives and with the stolen un-fire of singularities made sharp and my sweat was earthquake and my breath was static but IT was stronger so how did I survive?

IT is alone and IT is strong and IT won. Even over the gardener and she held power beyond me but the gardener did not shrug and make herself alone. IT always wins.

The Collapse was not even remotely close to a victory for humanity. It is one of the most tragic and devastating events that has happened in the Destiny timeline.

Crota marches with a thousand Knights and they say the sky above Mare Imbrium has turned into green fire. They are dying in numbers I cannot bear to repeat. He kills them one by one with a sword that eats their Light.

In this same card, Eriana-3, one of the guardians who was present on the moon during the Battle, says:

It showed me the battle. It showed me Wei Ning dead on Crota’s blade. It showed me how Crota killed a Guardian with a screaming knife hammered out of his own Ghost.

To claim that Destiny is just being told from the perspective of the winners is to ignore the many examples of tragedy and loss, both military and personal, in the lore.

What i was trying to say is that it all depends on your definition of ‘Good’ and ‘Evil’.
Everything has to kill to survive. It may be survival of the fittest, or just killing for food. The Hive probably don’t see slaughter ‘Evil’ because they have to kill to survive. U guardians are usually just brainless zombie killing machines. we never think, we just kill.
Something being ‘Evil’ differs slightly from person to person, and that is why there is a big upset over this argument.

I have already explained why the Hive don’t just kill to survive. For reference, this is what I said.

DrJazzyBebop:

The hive may have initially accepted the bargain with the worms as a way of ensuring their survival, but their eradication of countless species is not about survival. They have killed many species not because they posed a threat to the Hive’s survival but because they believe that this is the way to help the universe achieve what they call the “final shape”, where the only species which exist are those which have proven that they are worthy of survival. If the Hive simply fought to ensure their own survival, then they would be content to be at peace once this goal has been achieved. But the Hive do not seek peace. As Oryx says in XLVIII: aiat, aiat, aiat, aiat, aiat, “Aiat: what is at war is healthy, what is at peace is sick.” Nor do they have any mercy for those who they consider to be weak, as mentioned in XLVII: Apocalypse Refrains:

Only by eradicating from ourselves all clemency for the weak can we emulate and become that which endures forever. This is inevitable. The universe offers only one choice and it is between ruthlessness and extinction.

Guardians are most definitely not “brainless zombie killing machines”. They do not kill indiscriminately without thinking, and they have never attempted to wipe out races that do not pose a threat to our survival, as the Hive have done. Even with the races that do pose a threat, the Guardians do not seek to kill all of them, only those that need to be defeated for strategic reasons or who pose an immediate threat. If an enemy such as a Fallen Captain is trying to kill a guardian, is the guardian meant to just sit there and let the Captain kill them? If an enemy is making weapons that will be used to kill people, both guardians and non-guardians, are the guardians supposed to not attempt to stop the manufacture and supply of those weapons, as they did in The Arms Dealer Strike? To use another example, guardians didn’t kill Oryx just for the hell of it, they killed him because he would have wiped out humanity if given a chance, as he had done to many other races.

There are also Guardians who have questioned why they are fighting, such as Osiris. From the Osiris card:

But your curiosity was voracious— How much of a Guardian’s personality and memories were true? How much had been fabricated by their Ghost? Did Guardians share particular personality traits— a willingness to yield to authority, a tendency to do anything anyone asked for the promise of uncertain reward, a blind knight-errant mentality? Had the Traveler manufactured all of you as living weapons?

When debate became argument, and argument became acrimony, I realized you had already become a cult of personality, attracting Guardians who wanted a clear idea of why they were fighting, what they faced, and how they would ultimately win.

Osiris clearly does not fall under the category of “brainless zombie killing machines”, and neither do the other guardians who wanted to follow him and learn more about why they were fighting.

People’s definitions of “evil” may differ, but one thing that is generally agreed upon is that it refers to something that is extremely immoral. If annihilating countless races, even though they don’t pose a threat to your survival, and causing so much unnecessary suffering and pain is not evil, as the Hive have done, then I’m not sure what is.

i feel the worm gods are justified in enacting their revenge against the sky.
we are the original thieves, the dragons were wrongfully experimented on, caged and were at the point of extinction.
if the vex, -to create gentle places where life could thrive- removed the dragons of chaos from the mix, how far could life advance?
this past transgression is why the hive are the good guys in the overall story. once all the light is consumed they will become the avatar of the dragon of chaos again (guardians too)
the false god that the vex invented to save humanity is the problem. a pawn in a galactic struggle.
could you take the mind of a magical dragon and hook it up to a vex simulation?
you could channel that magical power to grant your own wishes, create or destroy.
what a powerful tool.
thank “god” it realized it was in a sim, (thank you raspy? maybe)
either way our “energizer bunny death star” is awake and so are the "Evil Empire"
time to make a choice do you fight for the light or the dragons.

There are so many false claims in your post which are not part of the Destiny lore that I’m not sure whether your post is meant to be satirical or not. For the sake of simplicity, I’m going to assume you were being serious and address each of your claims in turn.

thebladeofhades:

i feel the worm gods are justified in enacting their revenge against the sky.

The Worm Gods did not direct the Hive to attack the Sky, also known as the Light, because they sought revenge. The word “revenge” doesn’t appear even once in the Books of Sorrow. They wanted the Hive to attack the Sky and its agents, such as the Traveler, because they believe that the Sky prevents the Worm Gods’ goal of helping the universe achieve what the Hive call the “final shape”, where the only species which exist are those which have proven that they are worthy of survival. In XVII: The Weakness Verse, the Worm Gods say:

Our universe gutters down towards cold entropy. Life is an engine that burns up energy and produces decay. Life builds selfish, stupid rules — morality is one of them, and the sanctity of life is another.

These rules are impediments to the great work. The work of building a perfect, undying creation, a civilization everlasting. Something that cannot end.

If a civilization cannot defend itself, it must be annihilated. If a King cannot hold his power, he must be betrayed. The worth of a thing can be determined only by one beautiful arbiter — that thing’s ability to exist, to go on existing, to remake existence to suit its survival.

All that would oppose this arbiter is unholy and false. All the misery and terror of your ancestors springs from the lies of the Sky, who deny this truth.

thebladeofhades:

we are the original thieves, the dragons were wrongfully experimented on, caged and were at the point of extinction.

By “we”, are you referring to the guardians? How could the guardians have stolen anything from the Worm Gods when they didn’t even exist at the time when the Worm Gods were imprisoned on Fundament? And what exactly was stolen from them?

Which “dragons” are you referring to? There are wish dragons mentioned in the Books of Sorrow but there is no mention of them being caged or at the point of extinction. The Ahamkara, who reportedly looked like dragons, were apparently hunted to extinction but there is no mention anywhere of them being experimented on or caged. Some have argued that the Worm Gods are the same species as the Ahamkara, or may be possibly related to them, but there is no definitive proof currently either way. Regardless, even if the Worm Gods are the dragons you are referring to, there is no mention of them being wrongfully experimented on, nor is it clear that they were at the point of extinction.

thebladeofhades:

if the vex, -to create gentle places where life could thrive- removed the dragons of chaos from the mix, how far could life advance?

Are you suggesting that the Vex have the same goal as the Sky of creating “gentle places where life could thrive?” The Vex have absolutely nothing to do with the Sky, nor do they have the same goal. According to Osiris, the Vex “seek Convergence, the reduction of all life to its simplest, most meaningless form. An entelechy of zeros and ones.” Sagira notes that “one of the byproducts of conversion is death”, although “the Vex don’t really want to kill you”. The Vex may not want to kill others, but they don’t want to nurture life that isn’t Vex either.

thebladeofhades:

this past transgression is why the hive are the good guys in the overall story. once all the light is consumed they will become the avatar of the dragon of chaos again (guardians too)

How on earth could the hive be considered the good guys in the story when they have annihilated countless races, even though they posed no threat to the Hive’s survival, and have caused so much suffering and pain? What is this “avatar of the dragon of chaos” you are talking about? The Worm Gods, and by extension the Hive, believe that once the Light is defeated then they will be free to pursue their goal of leading the universe towards its “final shape”. But there’s nothing said anywhere about the Hive seeking to become the “avatar of the dragon of chaos”.

thebladeofhades:

the false god that the vex invented to save humanity is the problem. a pawn in a galactic struggle.

could you take the mind of a magical dragon and hook it up to a vex simulation?

you could channel that magical power to grant your own wishes, create or destroy.

what a powerful tool.

thank “god” it realized it was in a sim, (thank you raspy? maybe)

What false god did the Vex create? At the risk of sounding like a broken record there is no mention whatsoever of the Vex creating a false god, or a god in general. Why would the Vex want to save humanity anyway?

Are you suggesting that the mind of a dragon - I’m still not sure which kind of dragon you’re referring to - was connected to a Vex simulation? There is no indication that this has ever happened, or that the Vex have ever had any contact with any dragons, whether they are Ahamkara, wish dragons. or otherwise.

thebladeofhades:

either way our “energizer bunny death star” is awake and so are the “Evil Empire”

The Traveler is not at all similar to the Death Star, aside from the fact that they are both spherical in shape. Unlike the Death Star the purpose of the Traveler is not to destroy planets or races. The Traveler seeks to help civilisations advance. It is an agent of the Sky, and the Leviathan describes the goal of the Sky as follows:

I’m not sure if by “Evil Empire” you are referring to the guardians, and possibly humanity in general, but considering you called the Hive the “good guys” previously I’m guessing this is the case. There have been multiple replies to the original post which explain how, far from being evil, humanity is fighting for its very survival. I will not repeat all the details in those posts here, but if you do indeed think that humanity is the Evil Empire then I suggest going back and having a look at them.

thebladeofhades:

time to make a choice do you fight for the light or the dragons.

Now I see that perhaps by “dragons” you are indeed referring to the Worm Gods, but as I mentioned previously there is no definitive evidence currently which proves that they are dragons.

it will be to much for me to answer your inquiries soi will try to show a bit more of my pov
i try to show the bigger picture then just what is said and not said in the grimoire and lore.
many things point to this story of destiny as the rebound of the galaxy.
at the start of the BoS only tech existed, no species uses magic, why is that?
the leviathan that guarded the worms was a machine.
i say the Vex controlled all life before the worms were freed, i say they trapped an original dragon and stuck it in a moon sized ball, then hooked it into a vex simulation.
this is the reason for the whole story.
what gods do we know of in destiny.
hive - dragon god
vex - black garden
cabal - wall of void
of these three known gods, who fits where in the sky vs the deep? or you can view it as tech vs magic.

Everything is becoming more ruthless and in the end only the most ruthless will remain (LOOK UP AT THE SKY) and they will hunt the territories of the night and extinguish the first glint of competition before it can even understand what it faces or why it has transgressed. This is the shape of victory: to rule the universe so absolutely that nothing will ever exist except by your consent

the sky were the rulers and they hunted the deep to near extinction.

from
Ghost Fragment: Mysteries 2
Ingress via dreams alone

A star I think. We count on stars as steady friends because they always rise and always shine but a star’s a delicate truce: an explosion caught by its own mass so that it can’t erupt and can’t collapse. Thus I imagine the state of the machine might be. But one force or another has gone awry and now it rests here, snuffed and broken, waiting for the two rival forms of ruin to be set in balance again.

it says two rival forms of ruin, if there not magic and tech what would they be in thin fantasti universe.
all the Ahamkara seek vengeance against the sky for the attack against magic, their lifeblood.

Prey and Sacrifice —
Uttered by Xivu Arath —
God of War —
THE DRAGONS. Our gods should be ours alone. Their smug freedom is an insult to me. I’d shut them all in cells. Bring them to me!

the worm gods and ahamkara and dragons are linked together many ways.
my views may differ from the main but they fit very well if you can see the grimoire as a story told by the winning side.
or try and divide the races by who uses tech and who uses magic.
hive - magic / everybody else - tech
why do sevitors look like vex balls?
why does concept are of the “space station” look like a vex ball with the traveler inside?
the fallen say the traveler looked different and even build monuments to it in D1 and D2, both look like a vex ball.
the “shield” of the traveler covers part of the EDZ, a piece to big to come from our traveler, but it could of been around it. just like the concept art (which has a traveler inside that resembles ours.
so many things get glossed over, little bits of info nobody acknowledges because it does not fit popular theory.

to answer some of your questions:
first i misspoke with “we” it would of been better to say the sky and what i think was stolen was their godhood.
i say the vex use at least a part of a dragon to power the traveler, possibly a mind or blind head hooked into a simulation, this sim makes the dragon believe whatever the controller wants.
the vex originally used its power to remove creatures of magic from the universe, knowing you cannot truly kill a god they trapped what was left at the core of fundament and went back to studying the life of the universe.
the dragon inside the vex sim/traveler gave in or was clued into the nature of its prison at some point (hard to go on when the simulation makes you think your brothers and sisters are dead at your shoulders)
one god trapped in a simulation of another god to stop/control the chaos a magical dragon of galactic scale could cause.
the original pact of the sky was for the good of life everywhere, but like any empire good intentions turn to overlord over time.

why does Oryx grow wings?
what if sword logic works because the hive are regaining the magic of the dragons one kill at a time.
the traveler spread their essence across the stars, Oryx got the closest so far to his true form.

sorry must go to sleep, work tonight.
feel free to check out more of my babble in the focus fire chat discord #spinfoil.
i will check in tomorrow

i try to show the bigger picture then just what is said and not said in the grimoire and lore.

Appreciated, but it’s important to stay within a factual basis. Our lead archivist, @PurpleChimera, has an excellent podcast episode on research and bias in the grimoire, which I believe has already been mentioned in this topic. Highly recommended.

In any case, there seems to be a growing school of thought that all grimoire is inherently unreliable. Previous forays into that area of discussion on this site and elsewhere have basically debunked that. The only times we come across a definitively unreliable narrator are when Hunters are shooting the breeze or we’re dealing with part-history, part-propaganda like the Books of Sorrow.

thebladeofhades:

at the start of the BoS only tech existed, no species uses magic, why is that?

This isn’t necessarily true. At the time the Books of Sorrow took place, the war between the Deep and the Sky had been ongoing for a long time.

Verse 1:8 - Leviathan
The Leviathan’s Warning
++We live on the edge of a war—
—a war between Formless and Form++
++between the Deep and the Sky—

The Leviathan refers to the war as if it is already in progress.

Verse 1:9 - The Bargain
For millions of years We have been [trapped|growing] in the Deep. From across the stars We have called life to Fundament, so that it might contend against extinction. For millennia We have awaited you… our beloved hosts.

The Worm Gods refer to a long period of imprisonment as enemies of the Sky.

Both the Deep and the Sky are capable of paracausality, which in Guardian parlance has been dubbed “Hive magic”.

2:6 - The sword logic
We will not give you the Deep, King Auryx — that power is for us, your gods. But we will teach you to call upon that force with signs and rituals.

Small minds might call it magic.

You are no longer bound by causal closure. Your will defeats law.

The war has been going on for who knows how long prior to the worm gods encountering Aurash.

The krill and other races of the Fundament are limited to technology until they are affiliated with one of the two powers-that-be: the Deep of the Sky. But this doesn’t mean “no one” has ever used paracausality, especially when the war has been in progress for a long time.

thebladeofhades:

the leviathan that guarded the worms was a machine.

The Leviathan may be part machine, like the Traveler, but it has biological material that the worm gods feed on.

i say the Vex controlled all life before the worms were freed, i say they trapped an original dragon and stuck it in a moon sized ball, then hooked it into a vex simulation.

this is the reason for the whole story.

Exploratory question here - where are you getting this? If it’s just a theory, then it’s an interesting thought, but highly unlikely for a number of reasons.

thebladeofhades:

what gods do we know of in destiny.

hive - dragon god

vex - black garden

cabal - wall of void

I assume by “dragon god” you mean the worm gods. It’s important to make the distinction, and not just because the general consensus is that they are related but different.

The Ghost calls the darkness in the Black Garden a god, but that doesn’t necessarily make it one. The Vex in the Black Garden did pretty much what Quria did when they encountered the Deep.

4:9 - open your eye: go into it
Soon Quria, Blade Transform manifested religious tactics. By directing worship at the worms, Quria learned it could alter reality with mild ontopathogenic effects. Being an efficient machine, Quria manufactured a priesthood and ordered all its subminds to believe in worship.

There’s nothing to suggest that the “wall of void” Calus encountered is a god. We don’t know what it is. It might be some representation of the Deep, but we have too little information, and certainly no foundation to assert that it is its own god.

If you were to ask “What gods do we know of in Destiny?” And you were answered with things that call themselves gods or have been called gods by others, then you would be left with the Traveler “divine presence of the Sky”, and the worm gods. The Deep and the sky themselves have never been referred to as anything more than a power or philosophy, or both.

thebladeofhades:

or you can view it as tech vs magic.

Already touched on this one. I think this is a bit of an oversimplified dichotomy; neither the Deep or the Sky uses exclusively one or the other.

thebladeofhades:

the sky were the rulers and they hunted the deep to near extinction.

4:2 - majestic. Majestic.
The fate of everything is made like this, in the collision, the test of one praxis against another. This is how the world changes: one way meets a second way, and they discharge their weapons, they exchange their words and markets, they contest and in doing so they petition each other for the right to go on being something, instead of nothing. This is the universe figuring out what it should be in the end.

From the mouth of the Deep itself. According the the sword logic, all life is on constant competition. If the Sky hunted the Deep to near-extinction, by the laws of the Deep this is rightful contention for the right to exist.

The conflict between the Deep and the Sky is one between two contradicting philosophies, a “test of praxis against one another”. It’s a fight between godlike entities over which system of beliefs wins out over time.

thebladeofhades:

it says two rival forms of ruin, if there not magic and tech what would they be in thin fantasti universe.

Any number of things. “If not [x] then what” isn’t an effective catch-22 when we’re dealing with this universe.

thebladeofhades:

all the Ahamkara seek vengeance against the sky for the attack against magic, their lifeblood.

This isn’t necessarily true either. Even under the assumption that the worm gods are ahamkara, or related to the ahamkara, the very verse you’re quoting Xivu Arath on up ahead tells of dragons not affiliated with the Hive, who were used in the war between Harmony and Xivu’s brood.

5:4 - The Gift Mast
Now arrives Xivu Arath, at the head of her armada. She fights the Harmony for fifty years with strategies and discipline. But the Harmony turn to dragon-wishes, and their wishful bishops wrestle Xivu in the ascendant plane.

Harmony is fighting in defense of the Gift Mast, which was made by the Traveler.

THE GIFT MAST. When the Traveler left Harmony, it made a monument out of the black hole’s polar jet. In the jet there is a hollow mast which sings in radiance. This is the Gift Mast and we will devour it, we will eat the Sky out of it, we will snap it like a bone.

These dragons whose wishes are being used against the Hive are clearly not aligned with the Deep or acting out of hatred for the Traveler.

thebladeofhades:

my views may differ from the main but they fit very well if you can see the grimoire as a story told by the winning side.

It’s commendable to take a stance that’s different from what’s generally agreed upon. But you’re basing your assertions on a certain type of hermeneutics, interpreting the lore favorably to support your opinion.

All research works according to that bias, including the research that makes the mainstream theories so popular; the important thing is to base it in actual fact rather than mostly conjecture.

thebladeofhades:

or try and divide the races by who uses tech and who uses magic.

hive - magic / everybody else - tech

The Hive have paracausal abilities from the Deep, but the Guardians also possess paracausality from the Sky. Don’t count them out.

There are also Cabal Psions, who have considerable telekinetic ability.

thebladeofhades:

why do sevitors look like vex balls?

This is an interesting observation, but aesthetic similarity isn’t enough to say servitors (or the Traveler) are Vex constructs. Remember that servitors and the Vex are radically different in how they operate and where their allegiances lie. Not to mention the Traveler itself.

thebladeofhades:

why does concept are of the “space station” look like a vex ball with the traveler inside

Pretty sure this has come up before. Concept art is cool in that it shows us what might have been, but given the numerous production changes to Destiny’s plot and planning, as well as the amount of art any project goes though before settling on a design, we’re better off taking what’s actually in the game as canon.

thebladeofhades:

so many things get glossed over, little bits of info nobody acknowledges because it does not fit popular theory.

Visual information like what you’ve mentioned usually doesn’t get factored into theory without some other evidence to support it.

thebladeofhades:

why does Oryx grow wings?

As we understand it, because he wanted to.

4:8 - The partition of death
One day Oryx decided to grow new wings. While he wrestled with his worm, he came upon his twin daughters dying in a wound between places.

I think your idea that Oryx was approaching the “true form” of a dragon is interesting, but it doesn’t seem like a question that will be answered anytime soon.

perception i guess is the key to folklore, lore or cannon.
how you view each situation tells the story you want to see.
each perception in the grimoire and other bits tells that persons perspective of events greater then their understanding. people use terms they know for things they don’t really understand to make it comprehendible to their knowledge.